Life After Medicine

Dinner

19/07/2017

For those that can manage to have a slightly higher carb content in their meal, these nuggets go really well with celeriac fries and buttered broccoli. You could omit the celeriac altogether though, or replace it with buttered cabbage.

Ingredients (serves 4)

2-3 chicken breasts

2 eggs

100g ground almonds

100g grated parmesan

1 medium celeriac, cut into thin strips

1 head broccoli

butter, for garnishing

olive oil, for cooking

Method

Heat the oven to 180C

Pour a generous amount of olive oil into a baking tray and then add the celeriac chips. Shake them around until they are all coated with oil, then put them in the oven for 20 minutes.

Meanwhile, prepare 2 bowls - 1 with the eggs in it, lightly whisked; 1 with the ground almonds and flour in, mixed thoroughly together. Cut the chicken into nugget-sized pieces, and then dip each piece into the egg, then into the ground almond mixture, turning over several times so they are coated thoroughly. Set aside on a plate until you have coated all of the chicken pieces.

Put all of your nuggets in a baking tray with a little olive oil, and cook for 15-20 minutes, turning once. If you've time it correctly you should be able to put the nuggets in when the celeriac chips have been in the oven for 20 minutes, and turn them over at the same time.

Chop and boil the broccoli while the nuggets are cooking, and serve with a pat of butter melted on the top.

These are also perfect for freezing. Freeze them once the nuggets have been coated with the ground almond mixture, and cook straight from frozen when you need them, just adding a couple of minutes to the cooking time.

I haven't managed to convince all of the children that my low carb chicken nuggets are just as tasty as shop-bought carb-laden ones, but the 9yo says he will happily eat them again, so I'm good with that as a starting point. He was also very happy to have leftover cold nuggets from the night before in a wrap for his school packed lunch.

02/07/2017

With three children in the house under the age of 10, and all of the various food preferences they have between them, finding a meal that all five of us can eat together is often a bit of a challenge. This is where meals such as fajitas really come into their own - as everyone can pick the bits that they want to eat from the different bowls on the table. However, the traditional version of fajitas relies on wheat or corn tortillas, neither of which are in any way low carb. With a bit of tweaking though, you can make low carb fajitas, by substituting lettuce for the tortillas. For my very active (and not very low carb) children I did have some tortillas available though.

Ingredients (serves 4)

4 chicken breasts

1 red chili

2 tsp paprika

2 cloves garlic

2 onions

4 peppers (I used 2 red, 1 yellow and 1 green)

1 avocado

Juice of 1/2 a lemon

100g cheddar cheese

Sour Cream

Olive oil for cooking

Salt and Pepper

Lettuce leaves (I used little gem)

Method

Cut the chicken into strips and put into a bowl. Finely chop the chili and the garlic. Mix with the paprika and about 1 tbsp of olive oil, then pour over the chicken and mix well. Leave to marinade for at least 15 minutes while you prepare everything else.

Mash up the avocado in a bowl with the lemon juice and set aside for later. Grate the cheddar and also set aside. Wash the lettuce and leave to drain. Slice the onions and the peppers.

Fry the chicken, onions and peppers in a large wok or frying pan, with about 3 tbsp of olive oil. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

Serve in a large bowl, with bowls of cheese, sour cream and avocado on the side. Use lettuce leaves to make low carb 'fajitas'.

31/03/2017

One of the meals my mum used to cook that I enjoyed the most was beef stew. I loved the way that the beef became so soft and tender when it was cooked, and I loved to mash the carrots with the buttered potato into the sauce. As a child I hated carrots in all other incarnations (including carrot cake - which I never understood), but in my mum's stew they became the most exquisite, meltingly soft, sweet mouthfuls of food. During the Weightwatchers years stews and casseroles were never quite the same. I still made them, following whichever low fat recipe I had managed to find, but they were never as tasty as my mum's one. Boiled potatoes without butter are just not very tasty, and the small portions of beef allowed were completely inadequate.

Over the last few weeks I've been experimenting with various ingredients to make some low carb stews and casseroles, and have been delighted with the results so far. One of the best results I have had was with beef goulash. I didn't serve it with anything as a side dish, although I think it would be lovely with some cauliflower mash.

I took this photo before I added a very generous swirl of double cream. It was very good without the cream, and would then be suitable for a dairy-free diet, but I must confess that I much preferred it with it.

Ingredients

1 kg braising steak

2 onions

2 cloves of garlic

1 tin tomatoes

1 tbsp tomato paste

olive oil or dripping for frying

4 peppers (I used 2 red, 1 yellow and 1 green)

1 tbsp paprika

400ml beef stock

1-2 tbsp double cream (optional)

Method

Chop the onions and garlic and fry in some beef dripping (or olive oil) until soft. Add the braising steak and brown on all sides.

Tip the onions, garlic and beef into an ovenproof dish. Add the tomatoes, tomato paste, paprika and stock and stir well.

Cover and put in a moderate oven (160C) for 2 hours. At that point take the dish out of the oven, stir in the peppers (and some more paprika if needed) and put it back in the oven for another hour.

Serve on its own or with cauliflower or celeriac mash.

Serves 4-6 people, depending on how hungry they are. Tastes even better the next day, and also freezes well.

--> I don't have a slow cooker, so have been cooking all of my stews and casseroles in a moderate oven for at least 3 hours. If you have a slow cooker though, I imagine this would be a perfect recipe to cook in one.